Thread: CA-Plan for Oakland-issued ID cards headed to City Council

Plan for Oakland-issued ID cards headed to City Council

Contra Costa Times (California)
May 26, 2009 Tuesday
By Sean Maher Oakland Tribune

OAKLAND The city should offer municipal identification cards to illegal immigrants, underage runaways and transgender individuals, according to a proposal Tuesday from city Councilmembers Ignacio De La Fuente and Jean Quan.

Suggesting Oakland follow in the footsteps of San Francisco and New Haven, Conn., both of which offer municipal IDs to illegal immigrants, De La Fuente and Quan said a program to make such cards available would encourage more residents to cooperate with police.

Deputy Police Chief Dave Kozicki said the police department supports the idea, believing "it will make our jobs easier."

Though he cautioned the ID cards should be issued with rigorous security protocols built in, and not be confused with a replacement for state-issued driver's licenses. "If someone does cross paths with law enforcement, if they have IDs it gives officers the ability to issue citations rather than always having to make arrests," he said.

If officers have that discretion, it will also encourage more undocumented immigrants to report crimes to police, or to give witness statements, De La Fuente said.

The same principle applies to people who are younger than 18 and for whatever reason do not live with their parents, Quan said.

"Another important group is transgender people, who may not look like the gender they identify with and don't want to list themselves as just 'male' or 'female' on an ID card," said Maria Dominguez of the Oakland City ID Card Coalition. The cards will not require their holders to list a binary gender choice and so will also empower members of transgender and transsexual communities, she said.

Many people in these communities feel afraid to report crimes to police. This means a number of cases of domestic violence, abusive housing practices and criminally poor working conditions throughout the city go unreported, according to attorney Jesse Newmark of the Centro Legal de la Raza.

Some local conservatives were unconvinced.

"If you're scared of being deported, you can report a crime anonymously," said Walter Stanley III, acting chairman of the Alameda County Republican Party. "I don't think an ID card is going to open up the floodgates and now we're going to have people reporting crimes who wouldn't have reported them in the first place.

"I think this is a kind of half-amnesty and I wouldn't support it," Stanley said. "Respect those who were in line ahead of you. If you want to come to this country, embrace this country. (Do) not come here to exploit it. You play by the rules. I don't think city governments should be pandering to those who are illegal immigrants."

To qualify for an ID card, an individual would have to prove their identity and residence in the city, De La Fuente said.

Homeless people would be able to prove residency by written verification from hospitals or social-service agencies indicating an individual had resided in Oakland for 15 of the past 30 days at the time they applied for a card, according to Claudia Burgos of De La Fuente's office.

Stanley disagreed that such a resource would be helpful.

"They're saying that homeless people regularly lose, or misplace or have their other IDs stolen," he said. "But what would be the difference? Are they saying the city IDs won't be lost or stolen?"

Representatives from Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums and Assemblyman Sandre Swanson voiced their support for the program.

The proposal passed a unanimous vote in the Finance and Management committee meeting, staffed by Councilmembers De La Fuente, Quan, Patricia Kernighan and Nancy Nadel.

The proposal is scheduled to go before the City Council on Tuesday. De La Fuente declined to lay out a specific timeline for the policy should it win approval from the council, saying more research would be necessary to discover a way to make the program budget-neutral for the city.

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To qualify for an ID card, an individual would have to prove their identity and residence in the city, De La Fuente said.

I'm sure they will...more than once I bet.

Just another backdoor for tax payer provided benefits for illegal aliens even though Mexifornia is undergoing a tax payer revolt and is for all intents and purposes bankrupt. Those ignorant and corrupt politicians, police officials and bureaucrats still don't get it..........

These people are sick and the town better wake up and quick!!

Did I see transgendered in there?

What is wrong with these people. Phoenix has that tired old excuse of sanctuary leading to more witnesses in a crime BS. All these people do is harbor each other. Period. In Phoenix there are so many illegals that when one gets in an accident they just get out of the car and run. Within a minute they can be inside a home of another illegal who doesn't want trouble so they close the door and no one ever finds the person. And, believe me, the news at night is filled with crimes these people are committing. Most of the time they never find them. If it's bad enough they cross the border and come back when things have cooled.

This sanctuary city policy is killing us. And California has so many financial problems right now because they have a ton of illegals. So, now they want bailout. Is this the American way? Are we going to let this be the American way?